Jack McDevitt: Ancient Shores

Ginny looked at Max. “I don’t think that’s going to make me feel much better, Tom.”

“Max,” he said, “what do you think about this? Does it make any sense to you?”

“No,” said Max. “I have no idea. But I’ll tell you one thing—that boat hasn’t been in the ground any length of time at all.”

There was a long pause on the other end. “Okay,” Lasker said at last. “Look, I’m on later this morning. I’ll do my stuff and leave right after. Be home this afternoon.”

It was a cold, gray, dismal day, threatening rain or snow. During breakfast a few people arrived and banged on the front door. Could they see the boat? Ginny dutifully unlocked the barn, hitched the trailer to an old John Deere, and pulled it out into a gray morning. Signs posted on the trailer requested people not to touch anything.

“Why do you bother?” asked Max, deeply engrossed in a plate of pancakes and bacon. “Leave it in the barn and all this will stop.”

“I’d do it in a minute,” she said. “But Tom thinks it would be unneighborly. He thinks if people come all the way from Winnipeg or Fargo to see this thing, they should get to see it.” She shrugged. “I don’t really disagree with that, but it is getting to be a hassle.” More cars came while Max was finishing breakfast. “We figure they’ll get bored soon. Or frozen. Whichever.” Ginny’s cool blue eyes touched him. She was still frightened, even in the daylight. “Max, I’d like very much to be rid of it.”

“Then sell it.” He knew she could have her way with her husband.

“We will. But it’s going to take a while. I don’t even know whether we have a free claim to it.”

Max finished off his pancakes and reached for more. He usually tried to be careful about overeating, but Ginny’s cooking was too good to pass up. “I wonder,” he said, “if there’s anything else buried here.”

She looked momentarily startled. “I hope not.”

Max was trying to piece together a scenario that would account for the facts. He kept thinking about the Mafia. Who else would do something this weird? Maybe the boat was a critical piece of evidence in a Chicago murder case.

Someone knocked at the kitchen door.

Ginny opened it to a middle-aged woman wrapped in furs, accompanied by a stolid, gray-haired chauffeur. “Mrs. Lasker?” she asked.

Ginny nodded.

The woman came in, unbuttoned her coat, and saw Max. “Good morning, Mr. Lasker,” she said.

“My name’s Collingwood,” he said.

Her only reaction was a slightly raised eyebrow. She turned back to Ginny. “I’m Emma McCarthy.” She had sharp, inquisitorial features and the sort of expression one gets from a lifetime of making summary judgments. “May I inquire, dear, whether your boat is for sale?” She closed the door behind her, leaving the chauffeur outside on the step.

“Oh, I don’t think so,” said Ginny. “My husband’s quite fond of it. We’re planning to use it ourselves this summer.”

McCarthy nodded and lowered herself into a chair. She signaled Max for coffee. “I understand perfectly. I’d feel the same way. It is a lovely boat.”

Ginny filled a cup and handed it to her.

“You do want to explore your options, dear,” she continued. “But I can assure you no one will offer a better price. I wonder if you’d be willing to let me look at it a little more closely. I’d like to see the cabins. And the motor.”

Ginny sat down across the table from her. “I must tell you in all honesty, Ms. McCarthy—”

“ Mrs. ,” she corrected. “My husband, George, God rest him, would never stand for it if I abandoned him now.”

“ Mrs. McCarthy.” Ginny smiled. “I’ll be happy to show you around the yacht. But I’m not ready to entertain an offer just now.”

Mrs. McCarthy pushed her coat off and let it fall back over the chair. Let’s talk turkey , she seemed to be saying.

Max excused himself and went to pack. It was time to go back to Fargo. With Tom coming in and the crowd wandering the premises, he could see no reason why he was needed. From the living room, Max watched cars continue to arrive. Rain was beginning to fall. Beyond the driveway, the fields were gray and bleak and rolled on forever.

Where had the yacht come from?

No serial number. No plates of any kind.

Sails that had to have been in the ground, Ginny insisted, for more than twenty years. Crazy. He knew that wasn’t true.

He dropped his bag at the front door and went back out to the barn to look at them. They were neatly stacked in plastic sheaths. He opened one and removed the fabric. It was bright white. And soft. More like the texture of a shirt than a sail.

When Ginny returned, he didn’t have to ask how it had gone. She looked ecstatic.

“She’s in your business, Max,” she said. “Do you believe that? Except that she restores boats .” She held out a business card. Pequod, Inc ., it read. Mrs. George McCarthy, director. Boating as It Used to Be .

“I take it she made an offer?”

Ginny’s eyes grew big and round. “Yes!” she said, and her voice escalated to a squeal. “Six hundred thousand!” She grabbed Max and hugged him so hard she knocked him off balance.

A van pulled into the driveway and opened its doors. Its passengers, who appeared to be a group of retired people, hesitated about getting out into the rain.

Max shook his head. “Don’t jump too quickly,” he said.

“What? Why not?”

“Because it’s probably worth a lot more. Look, Ginny, boats are not my specialty. But it’s never prudent to rush into a deal.” He screwed his face up into a frown. Damned if he could figure this out. “I don’t think you stand to lose much by waiting. And, depending on what it turns out to be, you might have a lot to gain.”

Ginny put on her jacket and walked outside with Max, where they stood on the porch with five or six tourists. The rain wasn’t much more than a light drizzle, but it was cold . “Ginny,” he said, “do you have any pictures? Of the yacht?”

“Sure.”

“May I have a few? And one other thing: I’d like to make off with a piece of sail. Okay?”

She looked at him uncertainly. “Okay,” she said. “Why?”

“I’d like to find out what it’s made from.”

“It feels like linen,” she said.

“That’s what I thought.”

She smiled. “Sure,” she said. “Let me know what you find out.” A curtain of hard rain was approaching from the west. “I better put it away.” She jumped down off the porch, climbed into the tractor, and started the engine. Most of the visitors, seeing the sky, decided to get out while they could and ran to their cars.

She had to back the boat into the barn. It was about halfway in, and she was turned around in the operator’s seat, trying to ease between stalls, when she stopped and stared. “Max.” She waved him forward. “Look at this.”

“It’s raining out there,” he protested.

But she waited for him. He sighed, jammed his hands into his pockets, and walked across the squishy lawn. “What?” he said. The rain got heavier. It drove against him, drilled him, took his breath away.

She was pointing at the prow, paying no attention to the downpour. “Look.”

He looked. “I don’t see anything.”

“I don’t think,” she whispered, “it’s getting very wet.”

A haze had risen around the boat, much the way it will on a city street during a downpour. Max shrugged. “What’s your point?”

“Look at the tractor.”

No mist.

Well, maybe a little. The tractor had been recently polished. It shimmered, and large waxy drops ran down its fenders.